IBM expects India to invest about $1.2 trillion over the next 20 years in areas like transportation, energy, and public security. The second phase of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JnNURM), which covers $40 billion in infrastructure-related projects, will play a key role in improving the country’s infrastructure capacity to support urbanization over the next five years. IBM is currently working on approximately 3,000 smart city projects globally; of those, about 30 pilot projects are from India.

About a year ago, I published a report on how cities are undergoing rapid transformation and creating massive opportunities for ICT vendors across Asia Pacific. Although the urbanization rate still stands at about 30% in India, it is growing fast. Also, an increasingly Internet-savvy population is demanding better citizen services. Indian state and city governments will make investments to build infrastructure on a large scale to meet the needs of their surging urban populations, creating opportunities for vendors. —

Despite the promise and opportunities that India provides for Smarter City initiatives, IBM has to deal with key challenges: